Related Data

Major Uses of Land in the United States, 2007

What Is the Issue?

The ERS Major Land Uses (MLU) series is the only accounting of
all major uses of public and private land in all 50 States. These
State estimates were started in 1945 and have been consistently
published at roughly 5-year intervals, coinciding with the Census
of Agriculture. Land use and land-use changes involve important
economic and environmental implications for commodity production
and trade, open space, soil and water conservation, and other
policy issues. To study land-use change, statistics on land use
over time must be developed. This publication presents the results
of the latest inventory (2007) of U.S. major land uses and
discusses national and regional trends in land use compared with
earlier estimates.

What Did the Study Find?

The U.S. land area totals nearly 2.3 billion acres. Major land
uses in 2007 included forest-use land at 671 million acres (30
percent); grassland pasture and range at 614 million acres (27
percent); cropland at 408 million acres (18 percent); special uses
at 313 million acres (14 percent); miscellaneous uses at 197
million acres (9 percent); and urban land at 61 million (3
percent).

Cropland. Total cropland includes land planted for
crops (82 percent of total cropland), cropland used for pasture,
and idled cropland (including acreage removed from production under
Government programs, such as the Conservation Reserve Program).
Total cropland increased in the late 1940s, declined from 1949 to
1964, increased from 1964 to 1978, and decreased again from 1978 to
2007. Between 2002 and 2007, total cropland decreased by 34 million
acres to its lowest level since this series began in 1945, even
though harvested cropland (which accounts for most land planted to
crops) increased 5 million acres due to a recovery of failed
cropland from severe droughts in 2002. A 26-million-acre decline in
cropland pasture contributed to this trend, partly due to
methodological changes in the 2007 Census of Agriculture that
reclassified some cropland pasture to permanent grassland pasture
and range.

Grassland Pasture and Range. The estimated acreage of
grassland pasture and range increased by 27 million acres (almost 5
percent) between 2002 and 2007, partly offsetting a decline in this
land-use type during 1945-97. The recent increase almost exactly
offsets the decline in cropland pasture over the same period. Based
on acreage for all grazing land (the sum of grassland pasture and
range, cropland used for pasture, and grazed forests), land
available for grazing declined from 783 million acres in 2002 to
777 million acres in 2007, continuing a downward trend since
the
1940s.

Forest-Use Land. Forest-use land in 2007 includes 127
million acres of grazed forests, but excludes an estimated
80 million forest acres in parks, wildlife areas, and other
special uses. Forest-use land increased 20 million acres (3
percent) from 2002 to 2007, continuing a trend that became evident
in 2002 and reversing an almost 50-year downward trend. The
14-percent decline in forest-use land between 1949 and 2002 was
largely due to forest-use land
reclassified to special-use areas.

Urban and Rural Residential Areas. Urban land acreage
quadrupled from 1945 to 2007, increasing at about twice the
rate of population growth over this period. Land in urban areas
was estimated at 61 million acres in 2007, up almost 2
percent since 2002 and 17 percent since 1990 (after adjusting the
1990 estimate for the new criteria used in the 2000
Census). The Census Bureau estimates that urban area increased
almost 8 million acres (13 percent) during the 1990s. Census
estimates based on the previous criteria indicate that urban area
increased 9 million acres (18 percent) over the 1980s, 13 million
acres (37 percent) over the 1970s, and 9 million acres (36 percent)
over the 1960s. Estimated rural residential acreage outside urban
areas increased to 103 million acres between 2002 and 2007. In
percentage terms, this 9-million-acre (10-percent) increase is
about a third of the 21-million-acre (29-percent) increase over the
previous 5-year period (1997-2002) and reflects the downturn in the
residential housing market that occurred during the mid 2000s.
Despite continuing large percentage increases in urban and rural
residential areas, declines in the remaining rural area are small
given the size of the available land base.

Special-Use Areas. Special-use areas include rural
transportation, national/State parks, wilderness and wildlife
areas,
national defense and industrial areas, and farmsteads and farm
roads. Over all 50 States, special-use areas have
increased nearly threefold since 1959, including a fourfold
increase in rural parks and fish and wildlife areas. Over
2002-07, special-use areas increased more than 16 million acres (6
percent). Some of the estimated rise in special-use areas from 2002
to 2007 was driven by improved data, leading to a reclassification
of miscellaneous and other land, which declined by 31 million acres
(14 percent) over the same period.

Regional Patterns. Regional land-use patterns vary with
differences in soil, climate, topography, and population.
Relatively stable patterns of land use at the national level
obscure larger land-use changes at regional and State levels. For
example, while cropland used for crops remained constant nationally
between 1964 and 2007, cropland used for crops increased by 12
million acres in the Corn Belt and Northern Plains and decreased by
12 million acres in the remaining regions. Over this 43-year
period, the distribution of acreage used for crops across major
crop-producing regions remained about the same.

Ownership. Nearly 60 percent (1.35 billion acres) of
the land in the United States is privately owned. The Federal
Government owns 29 percent (653 million acres), over a third of
which is in Alaska. State and local governments
own about 9 percent (198 million acres). About 3 percent (66
million acres) is in trust by the Bureau of Indian
Affairs. There were no major changes in these aggregate ownership
statistics from 2002 to 2007. Foreign ownership
accounted for about 1 percent (22 million acres) of U.S. land in
2007.

How Was the Study Conducted?

Data from USDA's Forest Service, National Agricultural
Statistics Service, the U.S. Census Bureau, public land
management and conservation agencies, and other sources were
compiled by State to estimate the uses of several
broad classes and subclasses of land in 2007. Standardized
procedures were used to develop the estimates. Estimates of
cropland, urban area, and special uses, which are based largely on
census data and administrative data, are developed first. The
estimates of forest-use land and grassland pasture and range are
then developed, followed by miscellaneous land uses. Though all
land-use categories require reconciliation among sources at the
State level, some categories in the MLU series are adjusted more
than others based on the residual amount of land after other uses
are tabulated. These categories include miscellaneous land and, to
some extent, grassland pasture and range-categories for which less
reliable data sources are available relative to cropland and
forest-use areas. In general, more confidence should be put in the
broader land-use trends over decades rather than specific 5-year
fluctuations.